BE Ready’s 8 Elements of Athleticism

BE Ready’s 8 Elements of Athleticism

At BE Ready Academy we believe that there are important elements to becoming a top athlete. To be a better athlete one must develop and better himself/herself in these areas. Here are BE Ready’s “8 Elements of Athleticism”.

THE CORE: Every movement starts at the “CORE”. When the abdominals, lower back, hips and glutes stabilize and assist in the rotational movements- then the “CORE” is activated.FLEXIBILITY: When muscles and/or joints are tight movement is restricted. When movement is restricted then performance is hindered.FOOTWORK: Speed starts from the ground up. It’s hard to make an athlete faster when they have slow footwork.BALANCE: This is “cornerstone” of all athletic movement. “A balanced athlete is a perfect athlete!”SPEED: The application of the force in a specific movement; trying to reach the highest velocity in the shortest time/distance possible; in other words, “getting from point A to point B the quickest and the best way feasible.”AGILTY: The ability to change directions in the shortest amount of time possible, “How fast can you move from left to right or forwards to backwards?”NUTRITION: Food is what gives the body the energy it needs for the task ahead, “Feed the body the best fuel and you will get the best results. Feed the body bad fuel and you will get bad results”.STRENGTH: The ability to exert force.

Those are the eight elements of athleticism. Now you are asking, “How can I better myself in these areas”? For each element you can do just about any kind of exercise to improve it, here is a list of exercises that we will focus on at BE Ready to help better your elements of athleticism.

THE CORE: First you can do any kind of abdominal exercise, but for the hip and glutes here is one of the best ways to work them both.Fire hydrants- get on all four (hands and knees), you will lift at the hip keeping your leg at 90 degrees and cock at the hip. Repeat with other leg and reps of 25 or more; you should feel this in the upper part of the glute and the hip.FLEXIBILITY: This is one of the most overlooked elements; everyone says they stretch but they never do. “When was the last time you stretched?” All you have to do is basic static stretching and it only takes 10-15mins after your workouts.FOOTWORK: This is easy to do and all you need is a straight line on the ground to do “line drills”. Here are a few to get you started and remember you can make up your own as you go.
1. Hip twist- here you want to make sure your feet are tight together as if they were taped to one another, keep your shoulders square and twist in the hips down the line; then come back backwards.
2. Single leg hip twist- the same as above but you are on one leg.BALANCE: I don’t care what anyone says, “everybody needs to work on BALANCE; it is so easy to do and good for you.”
1. Single leg balance- stand on one leg and with the same leg reach to the ground and come back up; to make it harder change your plane on which you stand (i.e. stand on a pillow, a half flat ball, and even your bed).SPEED: The only way to get faster is to sprint, sprint, and then sprint some more. You need to have a two to one ratio, for example, if you run two 40yd dashes you need to run one 60yd dash.AGILTY: For this drill you will need to have someone assist you, get four cones and make a square about ten yards apart from one another. Have the assistant stand in front of the square and you’ll start in the middle of the square. Now on your movement sprint to the assistant and he/she will point back, left, or right and as soon as they do change the direction they point. This can be done for 30-45sec and 3-4reps; looking to see how fast you react to the assistant.NUTRITION: This is easy; if you eat poorly you will play poorly. It is all about the food you put in you body, this is your body’s fuel and you want the best for it. Try not to eat fried foods and cut back on your sugar intake. Eat more green foods and low fat meats such as lean beef, chicken and tuna. Remember performance race cars never use cheap gas to race so why should you.STRENGTH: All you want to do is make sure that you are doing your calisthenics which are vigorous physical exercises for improving fitness and muscle tone, including pushups, sit-ups, pull-up, dips, and jumping jacks. Even if you do not have weights to lift you can always do body weight exercises (calisthenics) and you will be fine.
If you focus on these eight Elements of Athleticism and work on them just a little bit once a day you will become a more functional, faster, and explosive moving athlete. We cover all of these exercises daily at BE Ready Academy so hope to see you there.